Musings

Political debate and Twitter

23rd October 2009

Watching BBC’s now infamous Question Time with the odius Nick Griffin last night I found myself constantly refreshing my Twitter feed to see what my friends were saying. I was taking part in an audience debate outside of the studio, in real time and thoroughly enjoying it.

Twitter had provided a platform for millions of people to share their views and thoughts about the debate. In fact it was mostly just people sounding off about how abhorrent this political figure was, and a fantastic opportunity for @realnickgriffin to get some great tweets out. Actually though, that in itself is indicative of general public opinion for the BNP: nobody likes them.

the oxygen of publicity: let’s mix it with the methane of a “Pork Farms” based dinner and repurpose it as the Zyklon-B of patriotic fervor.

@realnickgriffin

If Twitter users are representative of British voters, how have the BNP garnered so much support recently. I’d have to blame voter apathy and disillusionment in the major parties. The few who are voicing their opinions in capital letters on Twitter are the ones who will be out there voting against the BNP.

I think the BNP supporters are most likely just people who haven’t fully understood their politics (by which I mean fascism.)